Ireland's Sublime West

Joseph Addison, Eighteenth - Century essayist, friend of Jonathan Swift, and co-founder of The Spectator with Richard Steele, travelled a good deal before he settled down in London. Indeed, he took a very grand tour of Europe (as was befitting young gentlemen of good breeding before they did any settling of any kind).


In 1699 he writes that "The Alps fill the mind with an agreeable kind of horror" (Remarks on Several Parts of Italy etc). We find this idea later in the Romantic Sublime of Philosophers and the great Romantic poets, but when one can quote a rational Eighteenth-Century literary figure, I maintain it is best to do so. Anyway, we had a sublime weekend just recently as we all peered over the cliffs at Dun Aengus on Inis Mor, the Cliffs of Moher in County Clare, and the cliffs along the Atlantic Coast of the Burren. Some of us were better at peering than others. It was a magical weekend, with good music, fantastic scenery, awesome ruins, and prehistoric sites. This was the last group trip of the study abroad experience in Dungarvan. While students continue to make their own plans for travel to London, Scotland, Croatia, Dublin, and Galway over the next few weekends, we, like Mr. Addison in his later years, are beginning to settle somewhat. There’s finals coming up and papers to do and all the things that keep us grounded to deal with. And yet, there is still much time to explore.